Vegan & Gluten Free Pistachio Muffins with Strawberry Cream Cheese Glaze

Happy Monday, loves. I hope you had a fantastic weekend.

Sometimes I never know how to start these posts other than to tell you about the days that seem to pass by too quickly. These few weeks have flown by as I developed and shot nearly 10 recipes. I’m traveling on an off for the next few weeks so I wanted to be prepared with recipes to share with you now that Spring is almost here.

By the way, Tony and I are headed to Sedona this weekend, so if you have any cool hiking recommendations, please let me know in the comments below. I so appreciate it (and you!).

Now, let’s talk cupcakes. No wait… muffins? I can’t decide but there seems to be an ongoing debate that whenever something is somewhat frosted, it then turns into a cupcake.

To me this is a muffin recipe because they’re a tiny bit denser in bite than a traditional cupcake But my oh my, are they heavenly.

I’m not sure what brought me to create these beautiful vegan AND gluten free muffins, other than my love for pistachios and the fact that Whole Foods had wonderful, juicy plump strawberries on sale. I grabbed three containers, squealed with an awkward delight as the produce guy watched me and ran away with my cart to check out.

By the way, I’m 100% sure every grocery store within a 2 mile radius of my home thinks I go grocery shopping a little too much. But hey, this girl’s gotta feed you.

Anyway, I got home and paced around my kitchen wondering what to do with all the berries; I dug into my cupboards looking for inspiration while Milly meowed and did backflips off the wall. No joke.

Finally I found a bag of roasted pistachios that looked insanely green and ready to go into some sort of baking delight. Game on!

An hour later I was slathering the thick strawberry ‘cream cheese’ glaze on these wonderfully moist muffins made with a mix of oat flour and pistachio flour —which you can make yourself by grinding in a food processor. Easy peasy.

The strawberry cream cheese glaze is made with a mix of Go Veggie’s vegan cream cheese, powdered sugar (just a lil) and a homemade strawberry syrup puree that you’ll want to put on everything. Honestly it tastes exactly like the strawberry cream cheese you’d like from a bagel shop, except much more fresh and dairy free/vegan. You can get a coupon for Go Veggie products here.

So you can call them cupcakes, or you can call them muffins. Whatever your heart desires. Either way, they’re delicious and perfectly pistachio.

I hope you love these crazy good muffins. xo! If you make this recipe, be sure to leave a comment below and/or upload a photo to instagram and tag #ambitiouskitchen.

More gluten free treats you’ll love:

Healthy Gluten Free Chocolate Chip Muffins

Paleo Double Chocolate Tahini Banana Muffins

Paleo Lemon Blueberry Bread

Vegan Paleo Banana Muffins with Chocolate Chips

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Vegan & Gluten Free Pistachio Muffins with Strawberry Glaze

5 from 2 votes

byby :Monique of AmbitiousKitchen.com

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Prep Time 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time 25 minutes minutes

Total Time 40 minutes minutes

ServesServes 8 muffins

Gluten free pistachio muffins made with homemade (and easy!) pistachio and oat flour, then topped with an easy scrumptious strawberry glaze. Vegan too!

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon flaxseed meal
• 3 tablespoons water
• 1 cup heaping shelled roasted pistachios (no salt added)
• 1 cup packed gluten free oat flour*
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 1/2 tablespoon olive oil (or melted and cooled coconut oil)
• 1/3 cup coconut sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon almond extract
• 1/2 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
• Optional: 1/2 cup diced strawberries
• For the strawberry glaze:
• 1 cup diced fresh strawberries + 1 tablespoon oat flour
• 1/2 cup water
• 4 oz Go Veggie Vegan Plain Cream Cheese
• 1/3 cup organic powdered sugar

Instructions

• Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Line a muffin tin with 8 liners and spray the inside of the liners with nonstick cooking spray to ensure they do not stick.
• Add flaxseed meal and water to a small bowl and whisk together to combine. Let sit for 5-10 minutes. This is called a vegan flax egg. The flax egg will form a gel-like consistency after a while; this is when you know it’s ready to use in the recipe.
• Add pistachios to the bowl of a food processor or high powdered blender and process for 45 seconds until pistachios are finely ground. Transfer to a large bowl and add in oat flour, baking soda and salt. Whisk to combine.
• In a separate large bowl add ‘flax egg’, almond milk, oil, sugar, almond extract and apple cider vinegar. Mix to combine. 
• Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and mix until well combined. Optional: Stir in strawberries (tossed with oat flour).
• Divide batter evenly into liners, filling 3/4 of the way full. Bake for 22-27 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean or with just a few crumbs attached.
• To make the strawberry glaze: Add strawberries and water to a small saucepan and bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low and simmer for 8-10 minutes or until sauce thickens so that it’s almost syrup like. 
• Once strawberries reduce and become syrup like, transfer to a blender or food processor and blend until smooth. 
• Add 3 tablespoons of strawberry puree to a medium bowl, then mix in powdered sugar and cream cheese. Mix until smooth. Taste and add more strawberry puree if you’d like or a splash of almond milk to thin out the glaze.
• Dip muffins in the glaze, or spoon glaze over muffins. Enjoy! Makes 8 muffins total.

Recipe Notes

You can also use almond flour or almond meal in this recipe if you don’t have pistachios available.

Shelled pistachios mean that they do not have the shells on them. So be sure to measure the 1 cup out without any shells.

To make your own oat flour: Simply grind regular gluten free oats in a high powdered blender until they reach a fine flour-like consistency.

Disclosure: This post is in partnership with Go Veggie! All opinions are my own. Thanks for continuing to support Ambitious Kitchen and the brands that help make this site possible!